Constitutionally, it is elementary and elemental that dissolution, at any time, is a last resort, when no other exists.

In dissolving the Jammu and Kashmir assembly, governor Satya Pal Malik has covered himself in administrative, constitutional and political ignominy. That he may avoid judicial strictures is not for lack of trying or for unblemished conduct, but fortuitous and because of J&K’s political exigencies.

Many issues of seminal constitutional importance have their lighter moments but few have given the degree of comic relief provided by governor Malik’s helplessness (without staff) at Raj Bhavan to receive calls, faxes and all messages. Such comic responses may have tragic consequences for a sensitive state like J&K where, under governor’s rule, the state’s chief executive is apparently denuded of all power to receive information or give directions to anyone in times of emergency. Hopefully, Pakistan or other global terrorists are not listening and not induced to take extra liberties with such a lax administration. But certainly the Centre should wake up and provide some logistical support.

Constitutionally, it is elementary and elemental that dissolution, at any time, is a last resort, when no other exists. Secondly, it is doubly so when the assembly has more than a third of its scheduled duration left. Thirdly, even if the governor has to dissolve the House, he has to do so after at least making the pretence of consulting all political parties and stakeholders. No wonder deathly paralysis had to descend on Raj Bhavan to obviate the possibility of such

Had even the farce of a consultation been initiated, the governor would have faced the undeniable reality of numbers. If the principal stakeholders of J&K, PDP, NC and Congress, howsoever disparate and warring, with smaller groups and independents decided to form an anti-BJP front, the governor perforce had to return a factual finding regarding numbers and that was the last thing that the Centre could have afforded. If faxes and telephones had been allowed to work at the governor’s residence, such undeniable numbers could have been only dealt with by the governor by directing a floor test after reconvening the assembly.

Such a floor test could have had only one result. The three principal parties would automatically have a comfortable majority in the assembly for the simple reason that there is no other political formation in that state except BJP and a few small groups and floaters, whose numbers are known to all. Hence the result of the floor test was a foregone conclusion.

If two recent Supreme Court judgments are applied, judicial strictures against the governor and the Centre must follow. And that would include the home minister and the PM who took that decision on November 21, after the former’s hasty return from an election campaign, on a summons from the latter. The apex court in 2005 passed strictures against governor Buta Singh who dissolved the assembly sometime after the elections, even though he had recorded detailed reasons suggesting extreme likelihood of horse trading. His actions were judicially stigmatized, termed hasty, arbitrary and ill-conceived, the dissolution set aside and the assembly restored.

In words which have direct relevance to the J&K context, the court said: “The minority governments are not unknown... It is also not unknown that despite various differences of perception, the party, group or MLAs may still not opt to take a step which may lead to the fall of the government for various reasons including their being not prepared to face elections. These and many other imponderables can result in MLAs belonging to even different political parties to come together. It does not necessarily lead to assumption of allurement and horse-trading.”

More recently, the governor of Arunachal Pradesh received even stronger condemnation from the Supreme Court. He had initially advanced the assembly session by a month, thereby making it impossible for CM Nabam Tuki to prove his majority on the floor. Later, he dissolved the assembly and sought president’s rule. The apex court set aside the dissolution and restored the assembly, using words which are richly deserved by the J&K governor that they gave a “thrashing to the Constitution and a spanking to governance.”

The Sarkaria Commission makes it clear that where pre-poll alliance and largest party principles cannot apply, then a third and fourth option must be first tried, before the extreme step of dissolution viz post electoral coalition of parties, with all partners in the coalition joining the government, failing which a post-electoral alliance of parties, with some of the parties in the alliance forming a government and the remaining parties, including “independents”, supporting the government from outside. Clearly, the J&K context falls in these categories which the governor deliberately and illegally avoided.

The central government and BJP’s coalition failed J&K on all fronts. All relevant statistical parameters — ceasefire violations, cross border incidents, armed forces casualties and civilian deaths — have increased since 2014, after an unprecedented decade of relative calm and stability. Governance is an unrecognisable word now in J&K. Divisiveness and distrust is at its highest. A few months ago, the Centre suddenly and purely for BJP’s actuated considerations, promulgated governor’s rule. Now it has thrust an untimely and undeserved dissolution to be followed by elections which, including security costs, would cost several crores of rupees.

(The author is a third-term MP; Congress’ national spokesperson; ex-chairman, parliamentary standing committee; former ASG. Views are personal)